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”Intervention in atmospheric and climatic matters . . . will unfold on a scale difficult to imagine at present. . . . this will merge each nation’s affairs with those of every other, more thoroughly than the threat of a nuclear or any other war would have done.” — J. von Neumann

The theory of anthropogenic climate change began in the late 1800s, when the Swedish chemist and physicist Svante Arrhenius (1859-1927) presented his hypothesis that a doubling of carbon dioxide concentrations in the atmosphere would lead to a global temperature rise of 5-6 degrees. Unlike later influential advocates, however, Arrhenius thought that this heating was a good thing because it would make it possible to avoid a new Ice Age, and that it would benefit vegetation and crops. Only several decades later would carbon dioxide emissions begin to be seriously discussed in the scientific community.

In 1938, the British engineer and inventor G. S. Callendar expanded on Arrhenius’ ideas and speculated that the human burning of fossil fuels could have given rise to the observed warming since 1880. His findings were met with skepticism. The theory was, however, developed further by German meteorologist Hermann Flohn (1912-1997) who published his article Die Tätigkeit des Menschen als Klimafaktor in 1941, while he served in the Luftwaffe High Command during WWII.

These theories at first had no impact whatsoever on the scientific community. This would, however, change by the sharp increase in research grants in the U.S. after 1945 when the military wanted to get a deeper understanding of the forces of weather and making funds available for proper studies and the development of climate modeling tools. Callendar’s claims could now be tested more thoroughly.

In 1946 the U.S. President Harry S. Truman (1884-1972) founded the Office of Naval Research (ONR) and the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC), which in the 1950s became leading organisations in the financing of studies of carbon dioxide impact on climate. The climate agenda was originally a military project and was developed by interaction with institutions closely related to the Rockefeller family. The threat of nuclear war and climate change were intermingled. The former was considered to give rise to the latter, resulting in thorough studies on the effects of nuclear weapons on the climate.

As early as 1930, the Rockefeller Foundation funded the establishment of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute.

The following year, Swedish meteorologist Carl-Gustaf Rossby became a research fellow at the institute. He had been a student of Svante Arrhenius (who had also served as a mentor to Rossby). Rossby had come to the U.S.A. in 1926 to work at the U.S. Weather Bureau. In 1928 he founded MIT‘s meteorological programs, where he stayed until 1939. 1940-41 he organized and became head of the newly established Department of Meteorology at the University of Chicago where, in the following years, the Chicago School of Meteorology was developed.

Institute for Advanced Study

Rossby rose rapidly in rank and became one of the superstars of meteorology. This also resulted in a close collaboration with Jules Charney (1917-1981) and John von Neumann (1903-1957) at the élite Institute for Advanced Study (IAS) at Princeton University,[A] founded in 1930 by Abraham Flexner as an American equivalent of All Souls College, Oxford (with plans for the institute drafted by Tom Jones from the British Roundtable Group).

Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton University

Flexner was also part of the élite think tank, Council on Foreign Relations, which was a sister institution to the Royal Institute of International Affairs in London.[1] Close ties existed between the American and British élites – which became even more evident in the emerging climate agenda. Flexner had previously been a board member of the Rockefeller Foundation’s General Education Board and was the man behind the Flexner report (funded by the Carnegie Corporation) which resulted in a standardised medical training with a focus on the scientific method. This eventually led to Rockefeller interests gaining more control over the conventional medicine, and to alternative treatments getting severely disadvantaged.[2]

The Institute for Advanced Study was headed by atomic physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer (1904-1967).[B] Here climate forecasts were developed, using data models which were the first of their kind. In order to avoid climatic disasters, human intervention for balancing the weather system was advocated. This was not about reducing emissions through political agreements, as it is the case today. Instead, mathematician John von Neumann advocated an artificial climate modification to tackle the effects of possible climate change (through carbon dioxide or other climate changing factors). Techniques for making this possible had been patented by the Serbian inventor Nikola Tesla (1856-1943).[3] One patent was subsequently further developed by the U.S. Armed Forces and ARCO Power Technologies. Today, it goes by the name Geoengineering or Climate Engineering and has been advocated by, among others, the PIK Institute Director Hans Joachim Schellnhuber (under the name Geocybernetics) as a way of trying to control the weather and the threat of climate change.[4]

John von Neumann, who had studied mathematics at the University of Göttingen (through a grant from the Rockefeller Foundation) and was the originator of the Game theory, suggested that whoever could provide accurate predictions about the future would also control the world.

“John von Neumann for his part started showing an interest in weather forecasts as part of his almost religious conviction that most things in the world could be expressed in mathematical terms and that therefore most of the world’s future could be predicted – whoever could do that would control the world”[5]

This was something that interested the U.S. military and it soon became a priority for the ruling élite, and for the global planners, systems theorists, and futurists included on their payroll. This idea also came to particularly influence the philosophy of the Club of Rome which was established in 1968.

von Neumann had also been part of the Manhattan Project, which had been a playground for climate theorists. He merged the threat of a global nuclear war with that of climate change. This is how climate research initially came to be a predominantely military affair.

C-G Rossby, who had become an American citizen, was during and after the war involved with the U.S. Department of Defense at Pentagon and their interest in weather modification. He was, among other things, advisor to the U.S. Secretary of War, and part of the Joint Research and Development Board.[6]

In 1946 Rossby was persuaded to move home to Sweden to build the Department of Meteorology (MISU) at Stockholm University. Support for this initiative was given by the University of Chicago and the U.S. Weather Bureau (where Rossby’s former graduate student from MIT, Harry Wexler was Research Director). Funding came from the U.S. Office of Naval Research (ONR).

At the same time, there was strong support from the Swedish Government and the Minister of Education, Tage Erlander. This was part of the closer diplomatic relationship between the U.S. and Sweden. Rossby established a link between the two countries and laid the foundation for the close ties which would remain and be further deepened when it came to climate research. The U.S. military were directly involved in this too. They wanted to strengthen their ties with Swedish research, and U.S. military personnel were posted for advanced training in Stockholm until the mid-1950s.[7] Other international ties were created by Rossby. The pioneer Hermann Flohn, who became head of the West German Weather Service in 1958 and who later came to have a prominent role in the emerging climate agenda, was invited to Stockholm by Rossby.[8] Stockholm became, in effect, a U.S. base in Europe.

In 1949 Rossby started the scientific journal Tellus, based in Stockholm, which would become very important in the coming decade. Stockholm was established as a centre for atmospheric research and the question of the impact of carbon dioxide on the climate became an early priority.[9] The Institute did not do field studies, but only used theories of atmospheric physics. Rossby became known for not having made a single observation throughout his whole life.[10]

In 1954, the year after physicist Gilbert Pass (1920-1924) from Johns Hopkins University had said that that increased carbon dioxide levels could raise earth’s temperature in Time Magazine, it was decided at a conference in Stockholm that trace gases in the atmosphere would be researched more thoroughly, and that a worldwide network of monitoring stations for carbon dioxide would be established.[11] This was a preparation for the International Geophysical Year (IGY), planned for 1957-1958. One of the initiators of the IGY were S. Fred Singer (1924-). Much later he would become one of the leading sceptics but initially wanted to study the theory’s validity and be able to use the necessary tools for this (satellites). Organisers in Sweden were Rossby and his Assistant and former graduate student Bert Bolin (1925-2007).

In 1955, Rossby also started the International Meteorological Institute (IMI) which worked to strengthen international collaboration in meteorology. Rossby wanted the institute to be recognised by UNESCO and sought financial support from the Rockefeller Foundation for its formation. Due to his good relations with former Secretary of State, Richard Sandler, and Prime Minister Tage Erlander, the institute had direct support from the Swedish Government. Sandler became Chairman of the Board.[12] The close collaboration between the Government and the institute continued and was further developed over the years. The political dimension was interwoven from the start.

Plass’ career was closely linked to the U.S. Defense industry and had been part of the Manhattan Project at the University of Chicago. He then became Assistant Professor at the U.S. military related Johns Hopkins University and continued in the Defense industry (Lockheed and Ford).[C]

The President of Johns Hopkins University, Detlev Bronk (1897-1975), was an advisor to both the Office of Naval Research and the Atomic Energy Commission. Johns Hopkins worked closely with various projects for the U.S. military. Bronk was linked to the Rockefeller family, was part of the Board of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund and the Rockefeller Foundation in 1953, and became President of the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research (which in 1965 changed its name to Rockefeller University). He was also a Board Member of the Woods Hole Institute of Oceanography in Massachusetts, and president of the National Academy of Sciences. Thus, he had a great deal of influence.

In 1956, Bronk appointed a national meteorological committee which would ”consider and recommend means to increase the understanding and control of the atmosphere.” The Committee consisted of Lloyd Berkner, Carl-Gustaf Rossby, Jule Charney, John von Neumann, Edward Teller, and Roger Revelle. These assumed leading roles in this work. The Committee’s work led to the National Centre for Atmospheric Research in Boulder being founded in 1960, under the direction of Walter Orr Roberts – who in the 1960s and 70s, had an important role in implementing the climate agenda with support from the Rockefeller Brothers Fund and the Rockefeller Foundation.

Roger Revelle, who was Director of the Scripps Institution for Oceanography and close friend of Rossby, was in the 50s and 60s a central figure in performing the climate agenda and his institute was supported financially by the Office for Naval Research, the Atomic Energy Commission, and the Rockefeller Foundation.[13] He was also deeply involved in the international agencies and organisations, such as UNESCO and the International Council of Scientific Unions (ICSU).

In 1956, before a Congressional committee, Revelle described how, by increasing the carbon dioxide content of the atmosphere, a large geophysical experiments had been commenced, and sought federal funding for the study of global warming during the International Geophysical Year. This was granted. The media had also begun to report on the phenomenon. The New York Times wrote in October 1956 that human carbon dioxide emissions could lead to a warmer climate. The December issue of Time Magazine had C-G Rossby on the cover, with a warning in the featured article of the consequences of human impact on nature.[14]

At a meeting at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute in 1956, Rossby, Wexler, and Revelle had decided that measurements of carbon dioxide levels would be conducted. At the meeting, Svante Arrhenius’ grandson Gustaf Arrhenius was also present. According to Revelle, Gustav A. was not very alarmed by any carbon dioxide threat but felt, like Svante Arrhenius and C. S. Callendar, that it could be positive for the northern hemisphere. It would make the climate more pleasant and yield larger crops.[15]

The International Geophysical Year (IGY) 1957-58 meant the first breakthrough for the carbon dioxide theory and resulted in measurements of carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere being conducted at Manua Loua in Hawaii. Harry Wexler, through David Keeling (1928-2005) provided Roger Revelle with funding for the project.

Clearly, the early representatives of the carbon dioxide theory were not particularly alarmed by what would happen to the climate. They instead saw possibilities of establishing scientific institutions and get funding for their projects. They were careerists who saw which way the winds were blowing and gathered their own followings. They gained name and fame by being early proponents of a theory. They actively collaborated with other institutions abroad. They were also curious scientists wanting more resources for new exciting experiments.

Instead, there were other players who saw how the theory could be exploited politically. They were also able to take advantage of the scientists’ egos and eagerness to get into the spotlight. In 1959, a commemorative publication compiled by Bert Bolin was issued by Rockefeller Institute Press, dedicated to the memory of C-GRossby who had died two years earlier. In his last essay, Rossby had written about carbon dioxide emissions from the burning of fossil fuel.[16]

“It has been pointed out frequently that mankind now is performing a unique experiment of impressive planetary dimensions by now consuming during a few hundreds of years all the fossil fuel deposited during millions of years” (C-G Rossby)

Bert Bolin took over MISU and IMI after Rossby’s death and followed in the footsteps of his mentor. Bolin came become Chairman of the IPCC in 1988.

The threat of climate change was the beginning of a long Swedish-American affair with a close-working network of researchers. It was a predominantly military project, in which Sweden became the neutral ground and would play a leading role. Under Bolin’s leadership IMI came to play a central role during the years preceding the inception of the IPCC. After the climate issue had been raised in institutions which had come about with Rockefeller’s philanthropic contributions and with support from the Office of Naval Research and the Atomic Energy Commission, the Rockefeller family foundations came to increasingly take over the issue as it gained more political dimensions.

In December 1957, physicist and creator of the hydrogen bomb, Edward Teller (advisor to AEC), warned that the polar ice caps would melt due to increased carbon dioxide levels. Claims of this nature were presented in 1958 for a general audience in the propaganda film The Unchained Goddess, produced by Frank Capra for the telephone company AT & T/Bell Laboratories. The film was shown in schools and other institutions. Along with Detlev Bronk and management professor and later Club of Rome member Carrol Louis Wilson, Teller was during this time included as a panellist in the Rockefeller Brothers FundSpecial Studies Project, led by the family’s young protegé, Henry Kissinger (1923-). Here, the family’s priorities in the coming decades would be staked out, with concrete plans for their implementation. A changed political climate was on the agenda.

“We cannot escape, and indeed should welcome, the task which history has imposed on us. This is the task of helping to shape a new world order in all its dimensions – spiritual, economic, political, social.” (Special Studies Report)

[A] Rossby was offered a position at the Institute but turned it down.

[B] Oppenheimer had been the scientific director of the Manhattan Project, and then became the principal advisor to the Atomic Energy Commission.

This is the story of the Rockefeller family‘s involvement in the science of climate change since the 1950s. In my book, I show how they have operated to mobilise support among academics, politicians, activists, clergy, and in the business world, for the theory that man is guilty of causing climate change. It might seem contradictory given their roots in the oil industry but it follows a thoroughly calculated plan. So why did the heirs to Standard Oil attack the industry upon which their fortune was build and why have the Rockefellers funded and influenced the direction of climate research since the 1950s?

“Good leadership consists of showing average people how to do the work of superior people.” (John D. Rockefeller)

In March 2016 their small foundation Rockefeller Family Fund, with much fanfare, announced that they would divest from all holdings in fossil energy, including the family’s old crown jewel Exxon. The Paris Agreement had given a clear signal. Fossil energy would have to stay in the ground for human beings and the ecosystem to survive the coming decades. At the same time they accused ExxonMobil for having misled the public and for having spread doubts about the theory of human-induced climate change. Exxon spokesman said that the charge was not surprising as the RFF funded a ”conspiracy” against them.

“The Rockefeller Family Fund is proud to announce its intent to divest from fossil fuels. While the global community works to eliminate the use of fossil fuels, it makes little sense—financially or ethically—to continue holding investments in these companies.”

Peter O’Neill and Neva Rockefeller

Less than two years earlier, during the great Climate March in New York, the bigger foundation, the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, also announced that due to their fight against climate change they would start divesting from coal and oil sands. The Rockefeller family, who for ten years had tried to influence their old family company Exxon to change their position on climate change, now accused the company for having known and been trying to hide the seriousness of climate change from the public since the 1980s. At the same time, the company became subject of a real indictment of the state prosecutors in New York and California for having lied to the public and shareholders about the theory of man-made climate change. Behind the indictment was the Rockefeller-funded Climate Accountability Institute.

A very peculiar situation had arisen where the old oil barons attacked the very business upon which they had built their power and fortune. The oil industry, which had enabled the 20th century industrial development, the agricultural revolution, the pharmaceutical industry, and mass motoring, now joined causes with leftists and environmentalists, such as Naomi Klein (1970-), with her criticism of Big Business-led economic globalization, and climate activist Bill McKibben (1960-). Both members of the Rockefeller-funded 350.org which was responsible for arranging the major climate marches, the People’s Climate March 2014 and the Global Climate March 2015. The family that had made us dependent on oil was now taking a leading position in declaring the burning of fossil fuels immoral, destructive, and sinful, with Man as the sinner. So they had suddenly changed position on moral grounds?

Despite its eagerness to divest, the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, however, would keep their shares in Exxon in order to be able to continue exerting pressure, while their largest foundation, the Rockefeller Foundation, totally opposed any sale of investments in fossil energy. The latter had, by their actions, helped make the world dependent on oil. The family still had strong bonds to its old company.

The forceful accusations against the family’s crown jewel was part of a larger plan that had lasted for many decades. It was about consolidating power globally and creating a world with a more effective Global Governance and a new economic system. Smart Globalisation. A technocratic world where interdependent parts/nations would relinquish their independence to serve the larger community. It was the dream of a planetary institutional management, with touches of Thomas Hobbes’Leviathan. It was the dream of the Omega Point where the world (man – economy – ecology) would be coordinated in a technologically interconnected unit. A cybernetic World Organism.

“The age of nations is past. The task before us now, if we would not perish, is to build the earth.” (Pierre Teilhard de Chardin)

The stated motive was to save the world from the great climate disaster. But behind the climate façade lurked a desire to control both the population and the natural resources. Old priorities for the family and their friends in the global Superclass. In line with Friedrich Hegel both thesis and antithesis were controlled in order to reach the desired synthesis.

When the Rockefeller family is involved in something, you can be sure that it is very carefully planned. Their power has been built by the ability to work towards their targets over a long time horizon. The Rockefellers built their fortune on developing and controlling the oil industry in the United States. The company Standard Oil of Ohio was founded in 1870 in Cleveland, U.S.A., by the brothers John D. (1839-1937) and William Rockefeller (1841-1922). With renowned ruthlessness they created a monopoly of the refining and transportation of oil, the Standard Oil Trust, in the late 1800s.

John D. Rockefeller saw competition as sin and wanted to eliminate it. By shady practices, state by state fell in his hands and competing companies were either bought up or eliminated. In the end they had the entire United States at their feet. Their power was consolidated in 1882 in a nine man strong Board of Directors, with John. D. Rockefeller as Chairman. It was a cartel which was the first of its kind. The Board appointed directors and officers to all the subordinate companies. In this way, all the interdependent parts acted as a disciplined unit. The company controlled at most 90% of the market.

At first, the oil was used only for the manufacture of kerosene – a revolutionary product at that time, which effectively lit up homes across the world. Rockefeller had a flair for taking advantage of what people needed. By his aversion towards wasting resources, John D. found a use for the remaining waste product which others in the industry simply dumped – gasoline. By being so proactive, a fuel that was ready to power the nascent auto industry was developed. This also helped the Rockefellers survive the electrification of private homes. Gasoline sales exceeded kerosene sales from 1910. John D. also started expanding the business by investing in the mining industry and the Colorado Fuel and Iron company. Power and wealth was built on controlling natural resources.

In 1882, Rockefeller’s various financial operations began to be more coordinated and in 1885 the office was moved to 26 Broadway, New York. The family office then resided in the legendary 5600 Room at the Rockefeller Center for a very long period (1933-2015). This was Control Central of the empire. As an expression of his prosperity, John D. Rockefeller, Jr. (1874-1960) had a private elevator built that would take him from his office straight down to the private vault in the basement.

“We decided to start again at 1 Rock,” (David Rockefeller Junior)

In 2015 a relocation of the family office was made to 1 Rockefeller Center (Time-Life Building). It was a symbolic act. Rockefeller’s like the number One.

Some even believe we [Rockefeller family] are part of a secret cabal working against the best interests of the United States, characterizing my family and me as ‘internationalists’ and of conspiring with others around the world to build a more integrated global political and economic structure – One World, if you will.If that’s the charge, I stand guilty, and I am proud of it. (David Rockefeller)

Today Rockefeller & Co. resides at 10 Rockefeller Plaza, where the family’s investments and philanthropic operations are managed. The Board of Directors of the parent company Rockefeller Financial Services Inc. today includes five family members. The British banker Lord Jacob Rothschild is also a board member and the two families are since 2012 joined in a strategic partnership.

Lord Jacob Rotschild and David Rockefeller

John D. had learned the art of duping from his father, William Avery Rockefeller (1810-1906), a notorious fraudster and bigamist who went by the nickname “Devil Bill”, and given the strategic and mathematical thinking from his very orderly and deeply religious mother Eliza Davison ( 1813-1889). It was a combination turned out to be successful. John D., however would always feel hatred towards his father who had boasted that: ”I cheat my boys every chance I get. I want to make ‘em sharp.” William was long an embarrassing family secret.

Standard Oil became first true multinational corporation and came to expand worldwide.

John D. Rockefeller felt that business logic/capitalism was based on “survival of the fittest” and that in the end the smartest company would emerge as lone victor at the top. To reach this goal, they needed to be the best on the market. Their products were developed and refined to perfection. It was also about being able to outmaneuver all competition and being a master at manipulation. This mindset has since guided the Rockefellers, whichever industry they have taken on.

Philanthropy

1896, the same year as Svante Arrhenius (1859-1927) became the first scientist who made calculations about how the levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere influence the greenhouse effect, John D. Rockefeller Sr. retired from Standard Oil‘s direct operations and instead transferred the leadership of the company to his closest man, John Dustin Archbold (1848-1916). His son, John D. Jr., was also given also greater responsibilities.

Senior had new plans. He began, like steel magnate Andrew Carnegie (1835-1919), to invest his money in community-changing business and philanthropy. Now there was enough capital to seriously reshape the world, and to, just as with Standard Oil,provide it with an efficient management. Within a few decades, the Rockefeller philanthropy would com in contact with and support the research field emerging from the theories of Svante Arrhenius.

University of Chicago

Already in 1890 Rockefeller had founded the University of Chicago. A university that came to play a major role during the 1900s. The architecture imitated the Gothic style from Oxford, whose status was likely desired. Success soon followed. The investments paid off. To date, 89 Nobel Prize winners have been linked to the university.

Early on Rockefeller realised the benefits of having control over the production of knowledge and education. He exerted great influence over the University of Chicago. The financial advisor Frederick Gates (1853-1929) helped him build up the university and their philanthropic work. Gates was also behind the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research in 1901 (which in 1965 became Rockefeller University) and the General Education Board in 1904.These institutions would emerge as major pillars of the Rockefeller empire. Early on they exercised influence overeducation, health and medicine in the United States. This would grow stronger.

University of Chicago would have a major impact on the development during the 20th century and become one of the world’s most distinguished universities. Here, several disciplines and schools that benefited Rockefeller’s power base were studied and developed, e.g. political theory, sociology and behaviourism. The Manhattan Project was also developed here. The University of Chicago’s Department of Meteorology, built up under the leadership of the Swedish Carl-Gustaf Rossby, would later emerge as an important base when the impact of carbon dioxide on the greenhouse effect began to be researched more thoroughly.

Ida M Tarbell

Soon, however, there were problems for Rockefeller Sr, which forced him to return to Standard Oil. The journalist and teacher Ida M. Tarbell (1857-1944) had in 1902 revealed the company’s business practices in the article series “The History of the Standard Oil Company”, which was widely distributed. Tarbell was very thorough and not prone to speculation or reveling in juicy details. Objectivity and respect guided her work. Her investigative journalism contributed to Standard Oil in 1906 being accused of conspiring to prevent trade.

In 1890 a competition law, Sherman Antirust Act, had been created for preventing monopolies and cartels. Rockefeller managed to prevent the company being split up after a court decision in 1892, by creating the holding company – Standard Oil of New Jersey (Exxon). Now, in 1911, however, justice had caught up with Rockefeller, resulting in the cartel being broken up into 34 smaller companies.

The damage to Rockefeller, however, was not that great, as he had prepared for the conviction well in advance. Instead of resulting in a loss, the breakup rather increased the value of his capital, while he retained control over all of the individual companies. John D. had 25% of the shares when the company was broken up and got the same percentage in all the new companies. The original value increased fivefold in a short time.

The most powerful of them all was Standard Oil of New Jersey (SOCONY), which had its headquarters in The Rockefeller Center. After many years the divided companies slowly began buying each other up. Today, the remains of Standard Oil is accumulated in the ExxonMobil and Chevron, while BP bought up the rest. These companies currently own the rights to the name Standard.

The same year that Standard Oil was split up, family also started its banking business through the acquisition in 1911 of the Equitable Trust Company. The bank soon gathered all accounts from the Standard Oil family, and quickly grew to the eighth-largest bank in the U.S. By the Federal Reserve Act in 1913, they also, along with a number of other private bankers (including J.P. Morgan), gained control of the U.S. central bank. The architect behind this Act was Nelson Aldrich, whose daughter Abby (1874-1948) was married to John D. Rockefeller Junior.

In 1929 the Equitable Trust Company was merged with Chase Manhattan and from then on came to constitute the bastion and financial tool for the Rockefeller clan. It was from the outset closely linked with the Standard Oil Company and especially Exxon. This contributed to making it into one of the world’s most powerful banks. The Board of Chase had several representatives from the oil companies. The brother-in-law of John D. Rockefeller Jr., Winthrop Aldrich, became Chairman of the bank that Junior’s son David Rockefeller (1915-) came to lead between 1960 and 1981. In 2000, Chase merged with Rothschild’s bank J.P. Morgan and became even more influential.

The Rockefeller Foundation – Media and Propaganda

In order to improve his tarnished reputation as a ruthless industrialist, and also escape taxation, John D. Rockefeller Sr. created the Rockefeller Foundation in 1913. It was a development of the General Education Board, and had begun to be developed in 1907, based on the ideas of Frederick Gates. Before the breakup of the Standard Oil cartel Rockefeller had prepared meticulously. Now the world was ready for their philanthropic mission.

The press agent Ivy Lee was recruited to further clean the dirty image that had swelled to serious proportions by the Ludlow massaker in 1914. Hatred towards the super-capitalists was now at its peak. After a few years of effective P.R. campaigns, however, the picture of the family started to change and they became known as generous philanthropists. The ageing John D. was seen liberally handing out dimes to children and the needy in contemporary propaganda clips. Several major nationwide newspapers, including Time Magazine and Newsweek, were purchased in the following years by Rockefeller and his banking colleague, J.P. Morgan, to be used as their own propaganda channels. John D. Rockefeller wanted to prevent any major newspaper ever again writing anything negative about him.

The Rockefeller Foundation invested large sums in supporting the study of propaganda techniques and how people could be affected both by the media and politically. Researchers included Harold Laswell (1902-1978) from the University of Chicago. Laswell thought that people needed to be prepared very slowly for new ideas and events. Propagandists would introduce and cultivate them through long-term and well-developed campaign strategies. Symbols could be created with built-in emotional responses. The symbols could then be used to create large-scale mass action. Laswell felt that propaganda techniques should be given as tools for a scientific technocratic elite.

The Rockefeller Foundation gave substantial grants for studying and developing psychological warfare and management strategies. These were soon adopted on a large scale in order to benefit their own long-term goals.

The idea was to run the Rockefeller Foundation with the same efficiency as Standard Oil. The best minds were recruited for the board. The first year, John D. Rockefeller transferred $100 million.A huge sum at that time! The Foundation’s capital was built on shares in the family’s oil companies. By 1929, $300 million in share capital from Standard Oil had been transferred by John D. Sr.

John D. Rockefeller Jr. was the foundation’s first President before he moved on to the position of Chairman (from 1917 to 1939) while Senior cut back on his commitments. In 1952, Junior’s eldest son, John D. Rockefeller III was elected Chairman and stayed in that position until 1971. In addition, family members such as John D. Rockefeller IV (1937-) and David Rockefeller’s daughter Peggy Dulany (1947-) has been board members. Direct influence was reinforced again when David Rockefeller, Jr. (1941-) became Chairman in 2010. The Foundation’s management has close ties to the political and economic elite of the U.S.

The Rockefeller Foundation became another pillar of the empire. Through RF the family could support the activities and development they wanted and at the same time appear to be good and generous philanthropists. However, they were very careful with what they supported and how the money was being handled. It became an invisible hand that almost imperceptibly influenced the course of events in the United States and the world. Initially, their efforts were focussed on health and medicine. They also engaged in China where they established the China Medical Board. Relations with the Chinese rulers were good, and after a break of a few decades, they were among the first to resume contact with the Communist regime in the 1970s. This later opened up for China’s role in the world economy after the fall of the Berlin Wall.

One of the main techniques of the Rockefeller Foundation for gaining influence has been by working with established agencies to address solvable problems, and to persuade authorities and other institutions to assume leadership of those issues in the longer term. Once RF has planted their seed, the tree grows on its own. This has been a successful strategy. Many international organisations have been established in this way.

The Foundation’s stated aim was to ”promote the well-being of mankind throughout the world”. Early on theybegan engaging in international affairs and created the International Health Division (the predecessor to the WHO). They also began training doctors and took control of modern medicine. This happened to result in financial gain through their investment in the pharmaceutical industry – a very profitable form of philanthropy.

Via their foundations, the Rockefeller family has a powerful tool. They have avoided the short-sightedness of politicians and business both, and have instead worked for long term gains. Step by step they have methodically built up support for the changes they have wanted to accomplish. They have embarked on virtually every area of human activity. Banking / finance, politics, media, education / knowledge production, energy, agriculture / food, health / medicine, religion, technology / futurism, population control and conservation. These were areas which much later would come to be united under that great question of planetary destiny – climate. A question which also begged a great solution – The Great Transformation. The road to a sustainable Utopia. Global Environmental Governance.

Harry Wexler and C-G Rossby

Already back in 1930, the Rockefeller Foundation funded the foundation of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute in Massachusetts. The following year was the Swedish meteorologist Carl-Gustaf Rossby became Research Assistant. He had a stellar career and in 1940 was given the task of organising the new Department of Meteorology at the University of Chicago. Soon, interest would be directed at a colourless and life-giving gas and its possible impact on the earth’s temperature and the theory which 1896 was presented by Rossby’s mentor Svante Arrhenius …

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“While the borders of nation states have become almost irrelevant to global economic players (for instance) after the end of the Cold War, human and natural rights are still confined and dominated by thousands of frontiers. This situation can only be overcome by giving up a good deal of national sovereignty and establishing a true regime of global governance. As a prerequisite, the rather symbolic parts and pieces of the UN system must be transformed into powerful supra-national institutions: allons corriger le futur!” (Hans Joachim Schellnhuber)

Professor Hans Joachim Schellnhuber is one of the top players within the faction of climate research viewing man as responsible for climate changes. He currently leads the Potsdam Institute in Berlin and has served as an advisor to the EU Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso and German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

Schellnhuber has been given wide powers and is involved in numerous contexts. In addition to his advisory role to the political elite, he has been part of the World Economic Forum Global Agenda Council on Climate Change, the European Climate Foundation and editor of several scientific journals. Along with David Wasdell and others from the British Meridian Programme, he developed the ideas of ”Tipping Points” in the climate (Apollo Gaia Project), which predicted that small temperature increases could lead to disastrous consequences, for example by the tundra thawing and releasing large amounts of methane gas. Since then he has been involved in the World Bank report, Turn Down the Heat – Why a 4°C Warmer World Must be Avoided, which discussed the consequences of a mean global warming of 4 degrees Celsius.

Schellnhuber, however, was not only an advocate for the Tipping Points theory, but he also proposes large-scale solutions to the climate problem. This is, as the opening quotation illustrates, of ideas of a World Government and the associated global governance of environment and development. This is also illustrated by other statements by Schellnhuber. In order to curb the “climate crisis” he wants to establish a Constitution for the planet based on the UN Charter, a Global Council, and a Planetary Court. He sees this as a sophisticated version of the idea of a World Government. He also suggests that a number of national parliamentarians should be replaced by Global Ombudsmen. These should speak for future generations and stand as a counterweight to national interests. This has been criticized for being undemocratic practices. For, who chooses the ombudsmen?

Geocybernetic control

How, then, shall this global governance be conducted? Schellnhuber referred in an article from 1998 to something he calls Geocybernetics. This is a form of geoengineering and is a great plan to ”create an acceptable and long-term interacting evolution (Coevolution) between nature and humanity.” The article describes that when the modeling of the ecosphere is complete, there will be a variety of sophisticated methods available for global control of Environment and Development.

This is not just about developing methods for controlling soil systems and hubris-reeking ideas about, for example, preventing future ice ages by pumping small amounts of ”designer gases” into the atmosphere in order to balance the system, but also about human aspects. How many people can the ecosphere support? How should mankind best be distributed in urban and rural areas? One example of geocybernetic fantasies about the management of people is FuturICT, funded by EU and George Soros. That is, however, a separate post and will be addressed later.

Implementing these plans requires, according to Schellnhuber, that nations give up large parts of their sovereignty. He refers to borders now being irrelevant to the global economic players. It is this global elite which Schellnhuber ultimately works for, despite his talk of a democratic society which protects the interests of the majority rather than of the rich minority. In actual fact, this rich minority have been highly involved in the whole process from the beginning. This is done by funding radical movements which then demand the very change the elite wants to achieve. Schellnhuber himself has been involved in the European Climate Foundation, created by Big Business, which funds numerous environmental organisations (and even creates new ones) in order to implement the Foundation’s long-term goals.

Today, the concepts have been developed even further. The Potsdam Institute is currently working closely with other institutions in a network by the name Planetary Boundaries Research Network. Here Johan Rockström and Stockholm Resilience Centre play important roles. Through Rockström nine planetary boundaries which may not to be transgressed were identified in 2008. It was claimed that if they were, global disasters may ensue such as drought, sea level rises and pandemics. Schellnhuber was one of the signatories to the article where the results were presented and then published in Nature. It all also touches on the concept which David Wasdell at Meridian Programme developed before the G8 summit in Glenaegles 2005. The problems could not be solved with the current system but required stronger global institutions. Getting support for this eventually required more alarming warnings than what the IPCC could deliver. This is also something which Anders Wijkman and the Club of Rome have long since embraced and towards which the World Bank report came as if to order.

The global solutions were discussed at the conference Planet Under Pressure 2012 which was organized prior to the UN environmental conference Rio +20. An article authored by the Chairman of the Earth System Governance Project, Frank Biermann, (and 31 other signatories) with suggestions for changes in global governance was presented at the same time. The article stated that ”Human societies must now change course and be steered away from the critical ‘Tipping Points’ in the Earth system that may lead to a rapid and irreversible change. This requires a fundamental reorientation and restructuring of national and international institutions towards a more efficient governance and planetary stewardship of the Earth system.”

Biermann and Schellnhuber had ten years earlier written a number of articles together about global environmental governance and both have been part of the German Advisory Council on Global Change (WBGU), a scientific committee created by the German Government in connection with the Rio Summit in 1992. At the same time PIK became active. Both initiatives are closely interlinked with the objectives of Agenda 21, which was decided in Rio. WBGU publishes a flagship report entitled ”World in Transition” and Schellnhuber is one of the central Representatives since its inception. The title of the report indicates the basis of what it is about. Transforming the world.

Potsdam Institutet, WBGU and Schellnhuber were also involved in the conference, The Great Transformation – Climate Change as Cultural Change, in Essen 2009 together with Mercator Schtiftung and the Institute of Advanced Study. During this conference climate change as cultural change was discussed. This meant changes in people’s attitudes and the formation of a new participation culture. One of the sessions was about the future political direction and whether democracy had to be put aside in order to come deal with the ”climate crisis”.

Although Schellnhuber talks about creating a global democratic society, the thoughts that democratic institutions are not able to make the rapid decisions ‘required’ keeps being expressed. This also goes back to the Club of Rome ideas in books like The First Global Revolution. Individual nations’ interests are regarded as a problem. This mentioned by Schellnhuber in the WGBUs report from 2011 where a master plan for ”The Great Transformation” was presented. In this report a new political architecture, with a more authoritarian system of global governance that could oversee the plan, was called for.

”If we venture far beyond the 2 degrees guardrail, towards the 4 degrees line, the risk of crossing tipping points rises sharply. The only way to avoid this is to break the business-as-usual pattern of production and consumption.” (Hans Joachim Schellnhuber)

In order to implement the plans a rhetoric of threats is used, where we are given two options by ”the enlightened”. One is to continue with business-as-usual, and be led to out destruction in a fragmented world of independent nations, while the second option is the path to the ”sustainable paradise”, completed and implemented by a World Government that controls us from the geocybernetic control room.

What discussions are about is more what form this should take. How much muscle and what mandate should this global authority possess? Is it Thomas Hobbes’ ‘Leviathan’ that is needed? It is only to a very small degree about a genuine concern for climate change and the global weather system and more about how to create geocybernetic control of the climate. Ultimately, this is a work that has been going on since the end of World War II when the United Nations was created. The goal has been to gradually expand the organization and give it more power (the ideas for this utopia is described e.g.in Oliver Reiser’s The World Sensorium from 1946). It would be desirable if this was debated openly instead of being hidden behind cheap threat rhetoric where people are intimidated into submission. Now the wolves hide in the flock of sheep and play on people’s emotions and concerns for the future. Schellnhuber is then one of many false prophets blowing the doomsday trumpet.

Associations of Hans Joachim Schellnhuber:

PIK – Potsdam
Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research
University of East Anglia
External Professor at the Santa Fe Institute.
Commander of the Order of the British Empire
Max Planck Society
US National Academy of Sciences
Geological Society of London
International Research Society Sigma Xi
International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme (IGBP)
German Advisory Council on Global Change
Chair of the Global Change Advisory Group for the 6th Framework Programme of the European Commission
Member of the Environment Steering Panel of the European Academies Science Advisory Council, EASAC
World Economic Forum Global Agenda Council on Climate Change
Grantham Research Institute Advisory Board
Member of the High-Level Expert Group on Energy & Climate Change advising J.M. Barroso, President of the European Commission.
European Climate Foundation (chair)
Chatham House
Aspen
GEA IIASA
Global Contract based on Climate JusticeMember of the Board of the Stockholm Environment Institute (SEI)
Member of the Committee on Scientific Planning & Review of the International Council for Science (ICSU)
Member of the Editorial Boards of the scientific journals “Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences” (PNAS), “Climatic Change”, “Climate Policy”, “Integrated Assessment”, “Systems Analysis, Modelling, Simulation”, and “Europe’s World”
Member of the Joint Advisory Board on Climate Change Research at Imperial College and LSE (Grantham Institute)

How are political decisions made and anchored in the European Union? Whose interests are really being represented when we elect members of the European Parliament, and who profits from those decisions? The EU as an organisation is complex which is difficult to get an overview of. A plethora of lobbying organisations and NGOs operate in the background.

When I analysed EU politics I made unexpected discoveries about how the political game really works at this level. One was how NGOs have been completely incorporated into the political apparatus and largely just echo what the EU Commission itself wishes to implement. This is done through mechanisms of funding where the NGOs completely lack independence and undertake to comply with the Commission’s objectives in order to obtain grants. This has resulted in a host of new professional lobbyist groups while others have abandoned their earlier, more deserving missions, to seeking out the problem areas which can provide the greatest economic contribution to them. The groups who really want to stand up for their independence and go their own way instead become marginalised.

Another ingenious design to implement a desired policy are phenomena such as the cross-parliamentary organisation GLOBE International. These have had a great influence over the EU’s energy and environmental policies by their members (within the subdivision GLOBE EU) being responsible in the EU Parliament for a number of directives in these areas.

“GLOBE EU members played a prominent role in all the dossiers included in the Package, representing the EP as rapporteurs or shadow rapporteurs in negotiations with the Council and the Commission. (GLOBE EU and Climate Change 2005/2009)

A substantial portion of the MEPs who have been working with environmental and energy issues have also been members of GLOBE. In this way the organisation and their clients have had a major influence on the climate and energy policies of the EU Parliament. GLOBE was deeply involved in the EU’s comprehensive climate and energy package. GLOBE [also] advocated for the ban of the incandescent lightbulb (which was replaced by products which in some cases were counterproductive from an environmental standpoint). This ban was also supported by green GNOs such as Greenpeace.

Besides being represented in the EU Parliament, GLOBE also has connections to a number of parliaments across the world, including the Swedish, Russian, Chinese and Indian. Unlike other similar organisations, it is not registered as a cross-political group in the EU. At GLOBE politicians who outwardly represent a number of different political parties and ideologies intermingle. Via GLOBE, liberals, socialists, conservatives and green all work for the same agenda and a legitimate question is how close they are the voters who have elected them for Parliament? This development has created a political class [caste?] which, despite different party affiliations, are closer to each other than to the electoral they are meant to represent.

So who and whose interests are really behind GLOBE?

In January 2013m GLOBE International’s ”Climate Legislation Initiative” was launched, which aims to support legislators worldwide between 2013 and 2015. The process coincides with the international climate negotiations culminating with the final Climate Summit in Paris 2015. The meeting brought together 100 delegates from all over the world and took place in the British Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO). The meeting was also attended by the head of the UN Climate Change (UNFCCC). The event was sanctioned by the British Government and the material had been prepared by the Grantham Research Institute at the London School of Economics. Funding had already been provided by Zennström Philantropies (NGO by Niklas Zennström, the founder of Skype).

According to their website, GLOBE (Global Legislators Organisation for a Balanced Environment) was originally founded in 1989 ”by legislators from the US Congress, European Parliament, Japanese Diet and the Russian State Duma with the mission to respond to urgent environmental challenges through the development and advancement of legislation.” The initiative focused on implementing the objectives of the Brundtland Commission’s ”Our Common Future”, related to global environmental problems requiring global solutions, such as climate, ozone, acid rain and waste management.

Initially, 28 members of parliament from three global regions convened, including American senators Al Gore, John Heinz, John Kerry and Dutch socialist Hemmo Muntingh. An important organiser at this early stage was the Englishman Edward Seymour-Rouse. Although it outwardly was an American initiative, the British from the beginning played a key role through Seymour-Rouse and his powerful clients in London. It also turned out that since 2004 the headquarters are based in London and are under British leadership.

GLOBE is basically an Anglo-American project and represent political and economic interests primarily in Great Britain, USA and the Netherlands. In the background we find the British socialist think tank Fabian Society from whose headquaters GLOBE operated for a time.

GLOBE also receives support from the European Commission, the governments of Norway, Denmark and Germany, several UN agencies such as the UN Environment Programme (UNEP), the Global Environmental Facility and the World Bank. It also works closely with the media (through COM +) and the London School of Economics. This makes GLOBE a powerful association with friends in high places.

The organization is also related to the Club of Rome, with several of its members in its ranks, and has since the G8 meeting in Gleneagles in 2005 been invited to global summits. This coincided with climate change being brought to the forefront of the international agenda via Tony Blair. During his time as an MEP for the Christian Democrats, Club of Rome’s current chairman, Mr Wijkman, was the Chairman of GLOBE EU.

What then are the organization’s origins and agenda?

The foundation of GLOBE International comes from a futurological direction. It all started as a project that was subordinate to the American think tank ”Congressional Institute for the Future”. This think tank was founded by the futurologist and New Age guru Barbara Marx Hubbard in 1979, along with Senators Al Gore, Newt Gingrich and John Heinz. The ideology was founded on trying to predict events in the future and, based on these predictions, providing programs and policy solutions. The goal was then to be able to create the desired development and future.

The ideas were taken from the World Future Society and futurologists such as Alvin Toffler. A number of conferences were organized by Hubbard in the 70s where these ideas were discussed. The goal was to implement a global shift from an industrial to a post-industrial society linked to a global awareness through information technology (the Internet). The future was considered by thinkers such as Toffler to require new policy responses and the elimination of nation states. These would be dismantled and instead international organizations such as the EU and UN would begin to take over. Toffler called this ”The Third Wave”. Ideas such as these had early been promoted by, among others, HG Wells (Fabian Society) and Jesuit priest Pierre Teilhard de Chardin. It was a dream of a global utopian society which, according to Teilhard de Chardin, was part of the Divine Plan. Besides in GLOBE, these ideas are also reflected in the ideological basis of the closely related Club of Rome (which I will return to in future posts).

The GLOBE project was also about seeking market solutions to identified environmental problems. Among other things, an international trading of greenhouse gases, was suggested early on. This was something that GLOBE’s first President Gore could then capitalise on. He came to both warn about the problem and deliver the solution.

Globe’s organisation was conceived as an international hotbed of information and legislation for environmental experiments which could be introduced in several countries and regions simultaneously. The basic philosophy was not about GLOBE becoming yet another think tank. It was about creating a concrete instruments for action where the action plan is really being implemented.

One example of this is the think tank The Bee Group which, since 2010, gathers market interests in the EU under GLOBE’s supervision. Here GLOBE has collaborated with and received funding from large corporations such as Unilever, Holcim, Michelin and Dow. These have been able to present their problem areas, suggest policy measures and how the issue may be raised politically. In the expanded network, environmental organisations have since been funded and activated in raising awareness and support for the implementation of policy proposals. This also follows the logic and recommendations of Pieter Winsemius book ”A Thousand Shades of Green: Sustainable Strategies for Competitive Advantage” and of the Dutch state transition experiments (Transition Governance).

“The Bee Group is a forum for MEPs on the one hand and business and industry partners on the other, whose aim is to propose alternatives inspired by innovation and a long-term vision. Its purpose is not to defend any specific interests in the short-term, but to think about the future.”

First, the agenda and what is to be implemented between the main actors is determined, thereafter the voter base is influenced by the media, NGOs and activist campaigns, politicians respond to the public opinion that is emerging, and then implement the goals which were already set at the beginning. It is a conscious control of the whole process in which the players are interconnected. It is similar to systems theory ideas and cybernetics. The problem is that this goes against an order where politicians really listen to the voice of the people and what they wish to implement politically. Instead, different techniques are used for manipulating public opinion to be in line with the interests of the ruling elite.

Large corporations, which are involved, order policies that create market advantages for them. Either through regulations that disadvantage competitors or because they are at the forefront of ”green” replacement technology. This is done with promises of saving the environment and the earth from destruction and gathers public opinion which at all costs wishes to avoid such a Doomsday scenario. It is an ideal construction which outwardly appears as kindness and care for the planet. Criticism of this is then interpreted as being against the planet’s wellbeing. Who can be against sustainable development? What is sustainable, however, differ depending on who the player is. The politicians who are members of GLOBE are mostly just tools in a bigger game where they become agents of the agenda of creating the ”global dream kingdom” while working for large corporations which deliver policy solutions to identified environmental problems. The question is whether any of the people who voted them into Parliament are aware of whose interests parliamentarians are really working for.

The EU has thus become controlled by interests who work outside the purely partisan in order to implement their goals. In the EU Parliament party groupings also do not play the same role as in national parliaments. GLOBE International can be said to represent an emerging system of global governance where mainly British, American and Dutch interests are represented. This applies to those countries’ financial and political elite. Just like the name suggests, GLOBE’s influence is global and they operate on all continents. The boundaries in the global political game are ever more blurred. The foundation is futurological, with political decisions based on scenarios of a desired future. The Great Utopia.

The policy guidelines are compiled centrally from London, in collaboration with institutions such as the London School of Economics. This is done partly based on the interests of large corporations but also on the visions of a post-industrial society without nation-states. Despite its obvious major influence, GLOBE is largely unknown among the general public, which begs questions about power and legitimacy. What would the reaction be if an organization like this operated from headquarters in China, Iran, North Korea or Russia in order to exert influence on parliaments in the West?

Wake up! They try to steal the man in your head
make you kneel in front of icons
They took the place which wasn’t theirs
enslave you with a power they don’t have
don’t need to be guided
their lambs become rams
tell them the universe hides inside us all
Ein Volk, ein Reich, ein Fhrer…
is it what you got
or is it what they made
holy war for holy fools
blessed are those who break the rules
Men drink the scum of rage
at the lips of warrior priests
what happened, happened again
as no one gets; you cannot win
if someone lost
Streams of blood drown soldiers’ hate
but mothers’ tears call sons’ revenge
Stay away from the sectarian and gregarious
if you want to keep the precious gift we share
be right to yourself, be your own judge
and know, non-resolved things
generate themselves over and over…